MLB.com's Carrie Muskat has been covering Major League Baseball since 1981 and is the author of "Banks to Sandberg to Grace: Five Decades of Love and Frustration with the Cubs." You can follow her on Twitter @CarrieMuskat. Here, she blogs about the Cubs.

5/25 Extra bases

Some facts and figures heading into Wednesday’s game against the Mets:

* The Cubs have scored at least five runs in one inning nine times this season. That’s the most in the Majors (the Blue Jays are second with six innings of at least five runs).

* On Opening Day, the Cubs had two rookies on the active roster in Darwin Barney and Marcos Mateo. Now, they have four: Barney, Tony Campana, Welington Castillo and Scott Maine. Five players who were on the Opening Day roster are on the disabled list: Marlon Byrd, Geovany Soto, Andrew Cashner, Randy Wells and Matt Garza.

* Lou Montanez made his Cubs debut nearly 11 years after he was selected in the 2000 Draft. It’s not the longest wait by a Cubs Draft pick. Chuck Crim, who was selected in 1979 but did not sign, made his Cubs debut almost 15 years after he was drafted in April 1994.

* Have you cast a ballot for Barney for the NL All-Star team? You can write him in at second base. Barney is the top rookie in the Majors in hits (54), multi-hit games (19), and batting average (.318). He also ranks third among NL players who have the fewest strikeouts per plate appearances. And he has no fear. Barney has a .286 average with two strikes on him, which is fifth highest among NL hitters, trailing Pablo Sandoval, Matt Holliday, Prince Fielder and David Freese.

– Carrie Muskat

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2 Comments

Hi Carrie,

I know that your job isn’t to beat the GM, but perhaps you would float out there the possiblity of a piece about the thinking behind the starting pitching this year. It would be really nice to understand the reason behind coming into the season with no insurance policy for the rotation despite being the organization that has seen the likes of Mark Prior and Kerry Wood sustain season-altering injuries. While each move taken independently has logic behind it (the system was short of young arms so Gorzellany was shipping to Washington), I think the overall theme was wrong. Instead of preparing a plan B, it seems the Cubs just rolled the dice and hoped for health. This spring there were a LOT of potential starters in camp. It’s tough for me to believe that we are now in a position of running Russell and Coleman out there every 5th day. Is a piece like that possible?

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